Search Documents

By Richard A. Bideaux

With both unit costs per meter and average depth of drilling constantly increasing, there is a strong incentive to maximize the information acquired from drill holes, and then to make this information accessible to the geological staff. The larger the drilling project, the more advantageous computerization of data is over manual methods. The conversion to computer-readable form and the verification of large amounts of drill-hole data can be a substantial data processing task, but once accomplished, the benefits in increased accuracy and speed of interpretation will compensate for the time and effort spent in the work. For an exploration project progressing towards a preliminary feasibility study, about half of both the time and costs for all computer work of the entire feasibility study are devoted to drill-hole data base organization, and maintenance. Once drill-hole results are quantified and verified to be correct, they are immediately accessible and are not subject to further transcription or reinterpretation of errors. To obtain maximum benefits from computer utilization in this area, the drill-hole data base should be set up along with availability of the first data. For some companies, this may initially comprise a large number of purely speculative drill holes on a spacing of perhaps 1 or 2 km. Although few of these drill holes may encounter economic material, thought should be given, at this time, to the variables which will be logged when such material is found. In this way, it should be possible to set up a consistent format into which all future drill-hole information will readily be accommodated. This format may even be carried over into the data base requirements for an operating property.

Jan 1, 1979

By Robert S. Mayo

The haulage of muck from mines was first illustrated by Georg Agricola in De Re Metallica in the year 1556. In many of his ancient wood cuts he showed a crude car running on wooden rails. These wheels had no flanges. There were four pins sticking down from the car to guide it along the rails. Eventually they made the wheels of cast iron with flanges on them. In England, coal was hauled from the pit mouth to the nearest river or canal in "wains", or wagons, running on the common highways. These wains carried one chaldron of coal, weighing 2500 lbs and it took six horses to haul these wains over the atrocious roads of that day. Somebody, about 1760, invented a cast iron rail. These were cast iron troughs, 4 ft long laid on wooden sleepers. With these iron rails they found that one horse could do the work of six. But this U-shaped groove trapped all the dirt and grit. Somebody had the brilliant idea of attaching a flange to the inside of the wheel and from then on the rails were of timber protected against wear by a strap of iron. Rolled rails, of wrought iron, were first used in England in 1820. I am sure that many of you people have wondered why the British and American railroads standardized

Jan 1, 1974

By J. B. Rasmussen

As part of a purchase of a fleet of Caterpillar 785 trucks, Round Mountain Gold Corp., Cashman Equipment Co. and Caterpillar Inc. entered into a four-year contract for the major maintenance of the fleet of trucks. This contract includes fixed costs and guaranteed availability. The results have been excellent, and the fleet of trucks performs well. History The Smoky Valley Common Operation is a unique mine. Through a mixture of diligence and foresight, it has become the largest open-pit, heap leaching gold mine in the world. This was no small feat considering the remote area surrounding the mine. Round Mountain is located in north-central Nye County, NV. To the east of the town and mine lies the Central Toquima mountain range. To the west is the Toiyabe mountain range. Between them is the Big Smoky Valley, a flat expanse of sagebrush, salt grass and fine dirt.

Jan 1, 1991

By Li Jiuping, Zhong Gang, Chen Yong Zhang, I. Michael Gowring

The Liaoning Dahuofang Reservoir Water Transfer Project is an important development for the Department of Water Resources of Liaoning Province in northeastern China. The 85.3 km water conduit will transport water from the Hun River downstream of the Huanren Reservoir to the outlet on the Suzi River leading to the Dahuofang Reservoir. The additional water is required to sustain the growing cities of Fushun, Shen-yang, Liaoyang, Anshan, Panjin and Yingkou. The project is divided into seven contracts. Three TBM contracts comprise almost 75% of the work and the others are drill and shoot. The focus of this paper is about the creditable TBM performances achieved and some of the problems encountered by Chinese contractors; notably two having had no previous TBM experience.

Jan 1, 2007

By Seal. Thom

Large heap leach operations around the world contain significant under-leached metal values that present recovery challenges to operators. The first challenge is to find the location of the highest inventory. High resolution resistivity ? has proven sensitive enough to detect such zones in the interior of heap leach pads to target treatment or re-leaching. Newmont Mining Corp. has adapted the high pressure fracturing technology, used in oil wells to stimulate select zones in heap leach pads to add reagents in 3-D for re-leaching, changing zonal chemistry for improved recovery and heap closure. High Resolution Resistivity ? is able to subsequently monitor injected solution flow and determine directional permeability during Hydro-Jex stimulation. The combination of these technologies has shown strong economic success, for selecting targets in the heaps and monitoring solution application. These technologies are now available to the mining industry for adoption.

Jan 1, 2008

By James E. Lawver

During the past century, the Florida Phosphate Industry has established an enviable record of innovative technology in nearly all aspects of mining and beneficiation. A notable exception is the lack of technology to improve the present practice of storing waste clay in earthen dams. The rule which has been adopted by the Department of Natural Resources states, "Since storage of clay wastes for long periods of time interferes with expeditious reclamation and since above grade storage of clays takes otherwise useful land out of production and raises potential health and safety problems, below grade storage and rapid reclamation techniques are encouraged." The two waste products from the beneficiation plant are clay slimes (-0.1 mm in size) and sand tailings. The sand tailings do not present a problem since the tailings rapidly dewater to a dry weight of about 100 pounds/ft3 and make good land fill. By contrast, disposal of waste clay slimes is a formidable task. The basic problem is simply that the waste clay not only dewaters very slowly, but also that the ultimate solids content is very low and in most cases the volume of the clay greatly exceeds the available volume of below ground storage of the mined land.

Jan 1, 1984

By R. A. Hodge

Over the past decade, there has been a significant increase in effort put to tracking progress toward sustainability. Many aspects of society are participating in this “movement” including mining. The drivers are diverse and include evolving ideas in business and public administration as well as concerns for human well-being, community robustness, environmental integrity, and overall social and ethical responsibility. The scale in question varies greatly from local to global. For the most part, there has been a pre-occupation with developing discrete measurable signals. This paper argues that the overwhelming focus on the quantitative is ill-advised and that a more effective approach is to bring together the best of both quantitative and qualitative. The mining industry in particular is well-placed to affect this shift and reap the associated benefits.

Jan 1, 2004

By F. M. Doyle, Robert G. Robins, E. Peters

Stability diagrams for the Cu-S-H2O system have been widely applied over many years. Stability diagrams for aqueous systems generally, have been generated by computer, but with the programs for Potential-pH diagrams in particular, a common routine leads to error in multi-element systems. In this paper these errors, and some misinterpretation of diagrams are considered. In most of the published diagrams for the Cu-S-H2O system there has been no account of the sulfide complexes of copper. Here, the free energies of formation for the various species in the system have been re-evaluated for consistency, and some diagrams for the Cu-S-H2O system ( generated with the program DIASTAB Vers.5 ) are presented.

Jan 1, 1993

By Vojtech Gall

Pre-support measures for urban tunneling have seen a substantial development in the recent past. Ground improvement techniques, pipe-arch and spiling methods now allow for non-disruptive tunneling at very shallow depths under sensitive structures, rail tracks and roadways. The paper presents experience gained on national and international projects built over the past decade that represent case histories and therefore may be used as guidance for the development of similar solutions for future tunneling projects at shallow depths. Reference projects include tunnels for the Washington, DC Metro, London Underground, Dulles Inter-national Airport, Busway tunnels in Boston and the Ft. Canning Tunnel in Singapore.

Jan 1, 2008

By Yao Zhou

Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), the international seabed area (Area) and its resources are the common heritage of humanity (CHH). Patent rights can be incompatible with the CHH doctrine and its underlying principles because patent holders might charge unjustifiably high prices to license patented technology for exploring and exploiting the Area’s resources (creating a "patent holdup" situation), might choose not to license, or might license exclusively when doing so would contravene CHH principles. However, a reasonable patent licensing regime can contribute to sharing the benefits derived from the Area and promote environmental sustainability. Provisions of the UNCLOS that stipulated compulsory technology and financial transfers were removed in the 1994 Agreement relating to the Implementation of Part XI of the UNCLOS (1994 Agreement), but to promote equity and sustainability I propose a voluntary licensing regime modeled on the concept of reasonable and non-discriminatory patent licensing (RAND) that has been used in other contexts. The International Seabed Authority (ISA) or another entity will need to coordinate and promote this licensing regime through governance of intellectual property (IP) derived from the Area. This proposed approach can better effectuate the CHH doctrine and its underlying principles.

Sep 1, 2014

By James A. Doolittle

In the underground type of mining operation, the finer portion of the waste material commonly is pumped as a hydraulic slurry to a tailings disposal pond. (1)* The tailings slurry is deposited via a pipe manifold system located around the perimeter of the pond. This method of deposition produces zoning because the coarser material tends to settle out immediately while the finer particles tend to remain in suspension and are deposited progressively nearer the center of the pond. The manifold system must be raised periodically as the pond fills with the tailings material. Over a period of time, this procedure will produce a zoned embankment known as a tailings dam. A typical pond and dam are shown in Figure 1. In plan view, the dimensions of tailings dams can be on the order of miles, with the height of the dam reaching 100 to 200 feet. Due to such factors as inadequate compaction, inherently low strength of the tailings material, and the possibility of high phreatic surface, many dams at some point become unstable, i.e., the factor of safety against a slope failure approaches 1.0. Remedial measures are required to improve the safety factor in order to prevent massive failure of the dam. In most cases, stability can be improved by effectively flattening the slope of the dam as shown in Figure 2, but this is not possible in every case. Occasionally, a tailings dam is constructed adjacent to a natural or legal boundary so that it is not possible to construct a conventional berm or to reduce the slope angle with earth moving equipment. Even a terracing process would require removal of the material and this may not be practical. In such a situation, an alternate scheme to improve stability must be found.

Jan 1, 1974

By D. Rahal

All ores have an economic optimum particle size (Wills and Napier-Munn, 2006). This optimum value is often a compromise between the need to achieve adequate liberation for the efficient separation and recovery of valuable minerals and the energy consumed by the crushing and grinding process. It has been recognized for nearly three decades that grinding is the most expensive and least efficient stage in mineral processing (El-shall and Somasundaran, 1984). At that time it was estimated that grinding consumed between 25 and 70% of the total power required in mineral processing. This recognition drove the development of new stirred mill fine grinding technology in the 1990s (Jankovic et.al, 2003; Enderle et. al., 1997; Massey, 2008). These milling technologies have a reduced energy consumption compared to traditional fine grinding using ball mills. In the ?coarser? fine grinding applications this improvement is approximately 30%. The benefits increase to above 50% in ultrafine grinding applications (Lichter and Davey, 2006). Despite these gains, the US Department of Energy reported that an additional energy savings of up to 37% is possible in the minerals industry. They identified continuing research and development and implementing best practices in both grinding and materials handling as the primary avenues for the additional reduction (BCS, 2007).

Jan 1, 2011

By Adrian Coombs, Paul Magowan, Derek Zoldy

Continued development and intensification are fuelling the urgent need for new trunk infrastructure within The Regional Municipality of York and throughout the Greater Toronto Area. Permitting of these projects is increasingly subject to public scrutiny to severely restrict dewatering through construction technologies and the requirement for a comprehensive and effective Environmental Management Plan. Three current projects: one on the York Durham Sewage System and two in the City of Toronto 1.Conventional Design, Tender, Award: 4,150m (13,600 ft.) 2.7m (9 ft.) finished interior diameter soft ground tunnel for York Region’s YDSS Interceptor Trunk Sewer 2.Negotiated Contract: 3,800m (12,500 ft.) 3.5m diameter (11.5 ft.) rock tunnels for Enwave’s environmentally sustainable and innovative chilled water system in downtown Toronto 3.Conventional Design, Tender, Award: 2,200m (7,200 ft.) 3.3m diameter (10.8 ft.) rock tunnel for reinforcement of Hydro One’s primary hydro feed in the downtown core of Toronto These projects exemplify issues such as: EPB tunnel and sealed shaft technologies Substantial permitting requirements associated with dewatering Mitigation of rock creep Congested downtown rights-of-way Deep shafts and confined working compounds Unique scheduling and cost benefits when Owner, Contractor and Consultant can work together cooperatively.

Jan 1, 2007

By Sabina Brady

Nearly a decade and a half after the US and China established formal diplomatic relations, and two decades after the two countries signed the Shanghai Communique and established commercial ties, the world, and perhaps China itself, has discovered that a wealth of natural mineral and energy resources lie beneath China's soil and directly off its coast. The country's coal reserves and oil and gas potential are well known. Its ferrous and nonferrous metal reserves are respectable and in a number of instances pre-eminent. According to 1981 Minerals Yearbook estimates - more often than not below those now being claimed by China - the country's aluminous metal reserves are about 907 Mt (1 billion st); iron ore reserves are 40 Gt (44 billion st); and copper reserves are about 46 Mt (54.4 million st) of contained metal. In addition, the country has about 10.7 Gt (11.8 billion st) of phosphate reserves, the fourth largest in the world, and 3 Gt (3.3 billion st) of pyrite. China's national Sixth Five Year Plan promulgated in late 1982 ended a stringent three-year retrenchment or readjustment period in which a number of major development projects involving foreign participation initiated in the late 1970s were shelved. The new Five Year Plan is a signal both within and outside of China that things are now moving again, and that major industrial and service sectors are receiving the kind of funding and flexibility they need for expansion, construction and modernization. The new plan's strategy for growth is measured and much less grandiose and frenetic than it was five years ago when China flung open its doors to foreign companies and invited participation in large-scale development projects. Now, the country's reticence to spend foreign exchange to purchase key equipment, technology, and services -a reaction to these projects and the spending they entailed - is clearly on the wane. In China's effort to quadruple its GNP by the year 2000, there is a new willingness to use some of its substantial foreign reserves. In fact, it is projected that 1983 will witness a $1.9 billion deficit, with a $2-3 billion deficit in 1984 and 1985. The following article discusses implications the Sixth Five-Year Plan has for nonferrous metal development in China. It is the first in a series of three articles on Chinese mineral resource development to be published in Mining Engineering over the next few months. The second article will identify specific nonferrous projects underway, while the third in the series will focus on trade and development opportunities for phosphate and potash producers in China. China's Ambitious Plans In the last few months, the exploitation of China's nonferrous resources and development of its industrial processing capabilities have begun to receive increasing attention on both provincial and central levels. Unlike the earlier modernization drive of 1978 when China's ferrous sector - best typified in the Baoshan iron and steel project - got the lion's share of the Ministry of Metallurgical Industry's (MMI) energy and resources, it now appears that in some respects the nonferrous and industrial sectors are finally moving out from beneath the dominating shadow of ferrous and getting their own day in the sun. Separation of Nonferrous from Ferrous One clear demonstration of this is the establishment in April 1983 of the China Nonferrous Metals Industry Corporation (CNFMIC). The corporation is composed of 819 enterprises with over a million workers, and also includes 12 nonferrous metal construction companies, eight design institutes, and three prospecting companies. Of ministerial rank, CNFMIC is responsible for the development of both the country's nonferrous resources and its processing facilities. Although closely tied to the parent ministry from which it sprang (i.e. MMI), CNFMIC, at least theoretically, is separate and independent from it. One strong indication that this independence is, or soon will become a reality, can be seen from the fact that the new corporation is not headed by the former MMI officials, not even those who made up the ministry's now defunct nonferrous bureau. Instead, its president Qiu Chunfu is formerly of the State Economic Commission and the China International Trust and Investment Corp. Its general manager Fei Ziwen, an engineer in his early 50s, is from the Jiangxi Province Copper Corp. The new nonferrous corporation appears to be powerful

Jan 7, 1983

By D. S. Choi, H. D. Dahl, D. L. McCain

The paper examines current room and pillar mining practice in the U.S.A. from the standpoint of rock mechanics. Consideration is given to the deformation characteristics of the roof formation and the coal seam as determined in the laboratory as well as in the field. The results can be utilized by the practicing mining engineer to improve current mine design practice.

Jan 1, 1982

By David M. Mchaina, Michel Grenier, Stephen G. Hardcastle

An airborne dust survey was conducted at the Arthur W. White mine of Dickenson Mines Limited by CANMET/MRL and Dickenson Mines Limited Staff in April 1990 for the purpose of evaluating environmental conditions underground and in the surface mining plants. The survey was designed to measure respirable silica, total arsenic and lead concentrations at several workplaces. In addition, settled dust and rock samples were collected from workplaces and analysed for total arsenic content. More importantly, arsenic exposure data were needed to evaluate the impact of Ontario Regulation 176/86 as amended by Ontario Regulation 23/87. A total of 165 area and personal air filter samples were collected during the study. Of these, 85, 67 and 13 samples were for arsenic, silica and lead respectively. Sampling aid analyses were performed according to the Ontario Ministry of Labour Regulations. More than 90% of the workplaces sampled for respirable silica, total arsenic and lead were below the Ontario Ministry of Labour Regulations; and 10% of the workplaces sampled for arsenic shaved concentrations above the Threshold Limit value (TLV) proposed in the Ontario Regulation 176/86 as amended by Ontario Regulation 23/87. These results were used to identify occupations and/or workplaces where more sampling and control measures were required respirable silica, total arsenic and lead. This paper describes the results of the dust sampling program conducted at Dickenson Mines Limited.

Jan 1, 1991

The MineSight Schedule Optimizer (MSSO) is a new production scheduling tool developed by Mintec, Inc. using mixed integer linear programming (MILP) techniques. This tool was developed to solve the short- and medium-term schedule problems for surface and underground mining operations that involve multiple mining areas, multiple processes, multiple destinations and blending requirements. MSSO finds the optimum schedule in each period that achieves the objective while satisfying comprehensive product quality and quantity requirements as well as physical and technical constraints. Using the MineSight Planning Database (MSPD) as a central data hub, MSSO seamlessly works with MineSight 3-D (MS3D) block models and third-party data, MineSight Interactive Planner (MSIP), MineSight Haulage (MSHaulage) and MineSight Activity Planner (MSAP) to prepare data, formulate MILP models, calculate, report, fine-tune, save and visualize schedules. This paper presents the features and capabilities of MSSO. A case study is also given to demonstrate the applications of this new tool.

Jan 1, 2009

By M. Rezaee

Push backs used in the production planning of open pit mines play an integral role in generating annual cash flow. Although several algorithms for push back designs have been proposed, none have studied the optimum number of push backs. In this paper, different algorithms have been implemented for the push back design of a cross section of a copper deposit and the results discussed. Moreover, the optimum number of push backs has been determined using analytical and multiple attribute decision making (MADM) methods based on minimizing the risk associated with grade uncertainty, and minimizing stripping ratio, while maximizing net present value (NPV). According to the findings, the optimum number of push backs has been proposed to be between three and six, as lower quantities of push backs are more likely to achieve the calculated net present value, and have smoother stripping ratios for different pushbacks. This approach was examined in an operating mine and the optimum number of push backs determined to be four.

Jan 1, 2012

By J. R. P. Aguirre

Minerales Monclova, S.A. de C.V. (MIMOSA) is owned by Grupo Acerero Del Norte (GAN). This company has 4 underground coal mines and 1 open pit to feed it?s steelmaking facilities located in the city of Monclova in the North of México in the state of Coahuila. The current underground mines are Mine 3, 5, 6 and 7 and the future projects are Mines 8 and 9. In the last years Mines 2 and 4 have been closed because they finished their coal resources. The remaining mines have bigger production and developments requirements in order to accomplish the goals of the company. The mines have been working in deeper and gassier areas. These conditions have required improvements in the ventilation design and methane control systems for all the mines. In some cases the ventilation of some of the MIMOSA?S mines has been increased 80%, and besides this, an intensive methane drainage program has been applied using horizontal in-seam boreholes and gob wells. The short-term ventilation plan includes the construction of 3 new vertical shafts with 5 and 6 meters diameter for Mines 5, 6 and 7 and the purchasing of bigger new main and backup fans for each one of these mines. One of these vertical shafts and the purchasing of the first 2 fans is already in process. This paper will explain the evolution and results of the ventilation and methane drainage systems in MIMOSA and the ventilation planning for the future years.

Jan 1, 2009

By R. P. Gardner

Results of work on the development of a phenomenological model for the continuous flotation process using short-lived radioactive tracer techniques for the determination of model parameters is reported. A model that incorporates a flotation first-order rate constant and a residence time distribution based on the cross flow finite state (CFFS) model has been derived and investigated. The short-lived radioactive tracer techniques necessary to extract the model parameters have been developed as have the necessary nonlinear search methods. The conditions under which all the model parameters can be extracted from a single radiotracer experiment are detailed and illustrated. A microcomputer-based unique data logging system has been designed, assembled, and implemented for collecting the necessary transient radiotracer data. Results are reported for a continuous laboratory flotation system for the two systems mica ore and coal.

Jan 1, 1985